


To Save a Turncloak

by universalworst



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Arranged Marriage, Complicated Relationships, F/M, Gen, Hallucinations, I was working on this over a year ago and just now decided to start posting it, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, Jeyne-as-Arya, Non-Chronological, Probably Canon Divergent, Starts off fairly canon, Unrequited Love, Westerosi Politics, post-adwd
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-22
Updated: 2017-02-22
Packaged: 2018-09-26 08:37:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9876932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/universalworst/pseuds/universalworst
Summary: Asha Greyjoy, Jeyne Poole, and Justin Massey collude to save the life of a traitor.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Given ice or fire, which would you choose?

There were no windows in his tower cell, but the stones told him how the world outside looked. This was not Winterfell, with its pipes and tunnels of hot water running through the walls to keep the castle warm. Theon could hover a hand two inches from the cobbled chamber wall here and feel the cold emanating off its surface, and a picture formed in his head. Pale grey skies over white moorland. _Stark colors, to match their words. Winter is Coming._

No. Winter was here now in truth, and it brought with it cruel winds and snows as deep as a man stands. Theon hadn’t seen it in earnest, but he could hear the ghostly whistle of the winds over the flatlands to the south and east, and more than once his meals were delivered by Baratheon guards with stubborn snow clinging to their furs, from their boots all the way up to their beards.

Old Nan used to croak on about Winter and the Long Night. Bran and Arya and even Robb at times would be enraptured with her yarns of snows a hundred feet deep and Others riding upon giant spiders and feasting on the flesh of babes torn from the breast. Her pale, blind eyes would gaze absently at the stone wall, as if she was trying to recall something that wouldn’t come to her. Theon never paid her or her tales much mind, though. Mayhaps snow fell a hundred feet deep north of the Wall, but not here. The outer walls around Winterfell were only eighty-foot high, after all, and Old Nan’s beloved Bran the Builder would have much to answer for if he’d truly overseen the construction of such a massive design flaw.

Now, Theon hoped she’d spoken the truth. It would be a relief for Winterfell to become lost beneath the snow, and all his sins with it.

* * *

“Turncloak.”

Theon, he thought as he lifted his heavy head and squinted at the figure in the doorway. My name is Theon. But no sound escaped him. His cell was pitch dark, save the light entering through the open doorway, where a figure stood. Every morning was a struggle to rouse himself from slumber. The man felt weak, hungry, cold...and his own odor was nothing short of obscene.

As he tried to sit himself up in his bunk, a strong hand gripped the collar of his shirt and tugged him upright. In the dark room, he couldn't tell who the intruder was. Suggs? Massey? It made little difference.

“You reek,” the voice spat, pushing him towards the bright opening of his cell door. “Out with you. The king requests your presence.”

Theon almost thought he would vomit. That word. He shuddered as Richard Horpe—yes, this was Horpe—chained his skeletal wrists together and began dragging him down the corridor.

The king requests your presence. Perhaps today would be the day, then. Perhaps the king would finally do him in. It would be a mercy, in a sense. Theon Greyjoy was only truly afraid of one thing, and death wasn’t it.

Horpe led Theon down a corridor, giving his shackles a rough yank when his charge failed to walk fast enough for his taste. As they turned a corner to the king’s quarters, they encountered Ser Justin Massey, a grin on his face. The knight offered Theon a mocking bow and opened the door.

Theon stared into the room, and he dimly knew he must be mad.

It was burning. The floors. The walls, the maps. The table. It was all burning. Even the stones were melting. Theon had no time to scream before two hands pushed him inside the furnace.

What a clever ploy that was, making up a massive oven as if it were the king’s room. The heat stung his eyes and obscured the world around him, but he could still see two figures before him, clear as day. Amidst the flames and cinders, the two miller’s boys stood hand-in-hand. Their mouths were shut, and they said nothing aloud, but their milk-white eyes spoke to a sickly ache in his soul.

The turncloak fell to his knees. _Gods, stop staring! Which hell is this? How cursed am I?_

‘Fire,’ whispered a silken voice, breaking through the roar of the fire and the pounding of the boiling blood in his head. ‘ _Given ice and fire, which would you choose?_ ’

“Water,” he pleaded as the flames licked his feet. Why he answered aloud, he did not know. “Seawater, please, please! Give me to my own god, I beg you!”

The voice had none of this. It repeated its question: ‘ _Given ice and fire, which would you choose?_ ’

“No! No, please, drown me! I’m Ironborn! I’m—!”

* * *

 

A slap to the face from Horpe brought Theon back to his senses. Breathing heavily, sweat and now blood trickling down his face, he glanced about the study. No fire, save a few candles on the desktop, burning low amidst puddles of melted and reshaped wax.

Stannis stared silently at Theon, cold blue eyes nonreactive to his outburst. Then the king looked back down at the papers on his desk. “Hang him up.”

Stannis said no more, but Theon heard Massey hiss, “By R’hllor, he’s truly mad,” before a sharp look from Stannis shut him up. Horpe chained the frail wretch to the wall, letting him hang limply by his wrists like a living ragdoll. Theon dangled helplessly as Horpe returned to his king and Massey, and a quiet sort of council began.

The three spoke quietly amongst themselves for what felt like hours. Try as he might, he couldn’t hear what was said, though it was evident Stannis and Massey did most of the talking. By the time the king looked his way again, Theon’s arms ached and his hands were numb. Stannis ground his teeth, then looked away, nose wrinkled in distaste.

“Massey.”

The knight was examining the map tacked to the wall, arms folded casually across his chest. Hearing his name, he stood at attention. “Yes, your grace?”

“See if there’s no way to bathe him before you leave.”

The Smiler’s face twitched with revulsion. “Yes, your grace.”

Stannis nodded without looking up, but he did not seem ignorant to the knight’s expression of disgust. “You needn’t wash him yourself, Massey. Have a footsoldier fill a basin.”

Ser Justin chuckled at that clarification. He crossed the room as Stannis walked outside and down the corridor, shoes clacking against the stone floor with a crispness that made Theon’s head ache. And though he couldn’t see Massey, as he let his head hang limply and his eyes remained fixed on the stone floor, he could sense the big man’s smirk.

“Chin up, Turncloak.” Massey gripped Theon by his white hair and tipped his head back. Theon grimaced, focused his eyes the knight, and blinked stupidly. Massey’s grin only grew. “Things are looking up for you, you sorry sod. His grace has offered you a bath, you know. You ought to have thanked him before he left.”

“I wasn’t paying attention,” Theon lied as Massey unchained him from the wall and patted his back a bit too hard. He toppled down, crying out as his fragile knees crashed against the floor. He wanted to spew curses at the knight, but the tenuous pride he still had was too wounded to allow it.

Massey pulled up him by the collar of his shirt. “You weigh less than a scarecrow,” he laughed, “but I’ve never smelled a scarecrow that reeked half as bad as you.”

That word again. Theon shook his head in mute protest; _no, no, he’s Theon, not Reek._ “Theon,” was all he muttered.

Paying his maimed charge no mind, Massey dragged him down the corridor and down a flight of stairs. Whether by plan or happenstance, a figure sat huddled near the entrance to the hallway, clearly fresh inside from the cold. After a moment’s evaluation, Massey passed Theon off to the young, bleary-eyed guard. The boy was red-faced and smelled of ale, and it wasn’t until he led Theon to a small room with a large basin that the captive remembered he was to be bathed.

“I…” Theon stammered, not sure what was meant to come after. The boy glanced up at him impassively as he set to filling the basin from the heated pump spouting from the wall. Theon stared back at him, chapped lips parted, and croaked, “...I’d sooner bathe myself, if it’s the same to you.”

“I wasn’t going to bloody bathe you,” the lad snapped. “I’d sooner stand out in the cold again than touch your stinking bathwater.”

The footsoldier glanced irritably at Theon, then resumed pumping. Once the tub was half-filled, he seemed to lose interest and walked out without a word. The soldier gone, Theon dragged the basin against the door. There. He would be having no visitors now.

Stripped down to nothing, he wanted to retch. It didn’t matter that he avoided looking at the offensive scar. He knew it was there. He was often aware of the absence of flesh against his thigh, and it was never more potent than when he was naked. He grabbed a scour and scrubbed until his skin was pink and the water brown and foul-smelling. He clambered out of the tub and overturned it, pouring the soiled water onto the floor. He didn’t mind the stinking mess. He wouldn’t have to clean it.

After pumping the basin full of clean water again and pushing it back to block the door, Theon was exhausted and shivering. He sank down into the warm water, and his eyelids began to grow heavy.

“Cover up, Greyjoy.”

Theon cursed as his tired eyes opened again. A bloodied figure stood across the room, his nose wrinkling as he examined the prisoner’s discarded clothes. “You look worse than I expected.”

“What are you doing here?” Theon asked hoarsely, dizzy from the warm water and his tiredness and fear. “What was the fire this morning? Was that your doing?”

The ghost smirked softly. “Your mind is spent, obviously. Imagining things like fires and dead men.” He scrunched his lips and plucked at one of the arrows lodged in his breast and wincing. “There was no fire outside your head. It wasn't real.”

“I... I know that,” Theon muttered nervously. “Just as you’re not real.”

“I am real. I may not truly be here, but I am real...” His eyes flashed dangerously, lips curved upwards in what might seem a smile, but to Theon appeared more like a grimace of pain. “So, Theon Turncloak." He leaned forward, resting his colorless hands on the rim of the basin. "Why did you do it?”

Theon bowed his head and said nothing as Grey Wind’s dark eyes studied him.

An abrupt knocking at the door stirred the water in the tub. Theon startled out of his trance, and Massey's belligerent voice called through the door.

“Turncloak! Finish up in there!”

Theon sat upright and climbed out of the water, fumbling for his clothes. “Just… Just… I’ll be just a moment…!”

The ghost was gone now, of course, so there was no need for modesty. As Theon stared at the floor, water dripping from his tangled mat of white hair, he almost fancied he could hear Grey Wind’s howl in the wind that swept around the tower.


End file.
